Short Poem 03

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) was the author of many acclaimed poems (including In Memoriam which includes the famous lines "I hold it true, whate'er befall; I feel it, when I sorrow most; 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all).

Crossing the Bar, an 1889 poem, often appears in anthologies and is thought to be Tennyson's own elegy. The Wikipedia entry says that he uses an extended metaphor to compare death to crossing the 'sandbar' between the harbour of life and the ocean of death. It has four simple stanzas that alternate between long and short lines. It uses a traditional ABAB rhyme scheme. Scholars have noted that the form follows the content ie long-short lines have a wavelike quality that parallels the poem's narrative. The poem was set to music by Hubert Parry in 1903. It is believed that the poem was inspired by a visit to Salcombe on the Devon coast.

Son of a clergyman, Tennyson had his struggles as far as the Christian faith is concerned though this poem suggests some sort of vague personal faith in Christ. Perhaps the word 'crossed' has a double meaning?

He was more of a pantheist than anything. His wife quotes him saying, "About a future life we know hardly anything". In 1867 he spoke of being "uncertain regarding the condition and destiny of man." A few months before his death he was cajoled into taking communion but beforehand he warned the clergyman involved that he did not accept that Christian doctrine. Shortly before his death he said of the freethinker Giordano Bruno, "His idea of God is in some ways mine." Biblical scholar and translator Benjamin Jowett (c.1817-1893) said Tennyson "was one of those who, though not an upholder of miracles, thought that the wonders of Heaven and Earth were never far absent from us."

I like it for its sound rather than its theology.

Crossing the Bar

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;

For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.